


The Northwest Passage

by Crystalshard



Category: due South
Genre: M/M, POV Outsider, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-11
Updated: 2010-12-11
Packaged: 2017-10-13 15:00:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/138627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crystalshard/pseuds/Crystalshard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A young man, lost in the snow in the far north, encounters two men who help him out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Northwest Passage

_It is said that sometimes, a traveller in trouble will see them. Two men on a dog sled, led by a white wolf with near-human understanding. They'll appear over the hill, or through the snow, and they'll do what they can to help you. Sometimes they'll put you on the path home; sometimes they'll lead others to you . . ._

I shiver, huddling at the base of a rock outcrop, my knees pressed to my chest. The dark stone is keeping the worst of the wind and the snow away from me, but it's so _cold_. Colder than I'd believed possible back when Professor Hennessey had told us about this trip. She insisted that we all wear multiple layers, hats, gloves, good thick coats, and I'm glad she did. I'm still freezing, though.

I'm so tired. Feels like I've walked for hours – I know the town was just over the hill when this blizzard blew up. I thought I could get back there in a few minutes, but I must've gotten turned around somehow.

My fingers are numb inside my gloves, and I can't feel my feet any more. It's getting hard to keep my eyes open. Maybe I should take a nap, then I'd have enough energy to get up . . .

"Hey! Hey, you there! Kid! Wake up!"

The demanding male voice jolts me out of the blank doze that I'd been wrapped in, but I don't want to move.

"Excuse me, young man. You need to wake up." Another man, this voice gentler but no less insistent.

"Wake up! C'mon, you idiot, did nobody tell you about not falling asleep in the snow?" There's a pause, as if the unknown man is rolling his eyes or shaking his head or something. "Ben, why do these guys never learn?"

"They do learn, Ray. It's simply that there are always more people in need of the lesson." The second man would make a good lecturer, I think drowsily. He's already got the tone spot-on. "Anyway, it's our duty to . . ."

". . . aid travellers in distress. Yeah, I know." There's genuine affection in the first man's tone, a ritual complaint that has long since lost any bitterness or sting.

I reluctantly lift a snow-encrusted glove to my face and wipe the ice away from my eyelashes, blinking slowly. One of the men is crouching in front of me, while the other seems to be over with the dogsled team. He's wearing a hat of some kind – a Stetson, I think. The dogs' barking sounds distant, maybe as a result of the dying wind. The snow must be clearing if I can see the dogs.

"Ben, he's awake! Hey kid, what's your name?"

The man talking to me is blond, with spiky hair and a no-nonsense expression. I feel like I'm being interrogated. It's an effort to move my jaw, and the cold air rushes into my mouth when I open it. "Mike. Michael Kerrick."

"Okay, Mike – can I call you Mike? Where'd you come from?"

"Connecticut," I say, the cold numbing my tongue. "Trinity College."

The blond rolls his eyes and throws up his hands, looking back at the dark-haired man at the sled – Ben, the blond called him. That means that the one talking to me must be Ray. Ben only nods and tilts his head in my direction, glancing at me and then resting his gaze on Ray. A slight smile breaks on Ray's face, transforming him from the interrogator to person, and he nods back at Ben.

Turning back to me, his exasperation is clear in both face and voice. "No, kid. Where'd you come from just now? The town, can you remember the name?"

 _Oh._ "Kugluktuk," I force out.

At that moment, a large white dog bounds up to me, sniffs me curiously, then wraps himself around my feet. I can feel the warmth immediately, and I reach out to stroke him. While I'm involved with petting the dog, there's a conversation going on above my head.

"Ray, did you discover his point of origin?"

"Yeah. Looks like the kid wandered in from Kugluktuk. Must've been visiting. Name of Michael Kerrick. "

"Hmm. Kugluktuk isn't that far from here. If you don't mind, Ray, I'll take the team and go find help. There will undoubtedly have been search parties sent out as soon as the snow cleared."

"Yeah, yeah, makes sense. Leave me some firewood, I'll try and stop the kid freezing to death."

"Ah, yes, that _would_ be bad."

Ray laughs softly. "By the way, what's with Dief? I thought there were, y'know, rules about this kind of thing."

"Diefenbaker always did have his own opinion of the rules." I hear resigned amusement in Ben's tone. "I'll be back as soon as I can, Ray."

"Well, okay. Just so you know, I'll be keeping you to that promise."

There is silence, then, and my brain isn't working well enough to analyse any of the undertones and odd references. There's the thump of wood on the ground nearby, and the sound of Ben shouting "Hike!" to the sled dogs.

"So, you're from Connecticut, then? Me, I'm from Illinois. Chicago."

I look up as Ray arranges the wood and the kindling, building up a small snow wall on the windward side to prevent the fire blowing out. "Chicago?" I echo, my hands still buried in Diefenbaker's warm fur.

"Yeah. I was a cop, Chicago PD. Then one day I came out here with Ben, tracking a criminal . . . and, well, here we are. So how 'bout you, Mike? What's your story?" I watch as he lights the kindling, the flames licking up tentatively and brushing the sticks before taking a proper hold.

"I'm an anthropology student. Professor Hennessey does this field trip every – every year, taking her students out to different . . ." The heat from the fire hits me then, and I start shaking violently. Strange, I never shivered when I was numb, but now I can feel my fingers again, I can't stop trembling.

"Hey. Hey! C'mon, Mike, tell me about the field trip."

I look up at him, where he's crouched down near the fire, his eyes locked on me. I can't help but notice that he seems far more comfortable in the cold, even though we both seem to be wearing the same amount of layers. I take a shallow breath. "T-t-this year, s-s-she decided t-t-to hire a boat and follow Sir John Franklin's route t-t-through the Northwest Passages. We s-s-stopped off at K-K-K . . ." I had to stop, my chattering teeth unable to let the word out.

"Okay, so you stopped off in town. Did a little exploring, stretched your legs some after being on a boat, decided to wander out to the edge of town. Storm came up, you got lost, and you wandered off in the wrong direction. That what happened?"

I nod convulsively. Ray's description is pretty close to reality.

"Want some advice, kid? Tough, I'll give it to you anyway. You get caught in a white-out blizzard, you dig in and stay where you are. It's warmer under the snow than on top of it."

I nod again, still shivering, and Diefenbaker whines a little.

Ray transfers his attention to the dog. "I know, Dief. Ben'll be back as soon as he can."

Diefenbaker raises his head, stares at Ray and gives a brisk bark before settling his head back on his paws. He keeps his head angled so that he can keep one eye on Ray.

"Oh, you think so, do you?" Ray looks up at me. "Don't mind the wolf, kid. He just likes to get the last word."

"W-wolf?" I ask, and I'd be scared if I had the energy to spare.

"Well, half-wolf, if you're gonna be picky. He really belongs to Ben, but I think he decided to adopt me somewhere along the way."

Diefenbaker makes a sound halfway between a sneeze and a bark.

"No, I was _not_ hopeless, thank you very much," Ray says grumpily. "Anyway, Ben taught me a lot about camping out here." For a moment, I see that same smile on his face that he'd worn earlier when he'd been looking at Ben.

"I-is that where y-you learned to m-make a fire?" I ask, not sure what to make of the fact that Ray is talking to – and apparently getting answers from – his dog. Wolf.

"From Ben? Sure. He was born out here. It's home to him. Home to me, now, too."

I hear a hissing sound, and its seems that Ray does as well, because he looks around to see the sled approaching. And if I'd thought he'd looked happy before, that's nothing to the way he lights up when he sees Ben heading towards us.

"Whoa!" Ben shouts to the dogs, and does something with his feet as the sled halts. "I led them towards this area," he says. "They should be arriving within the next few minutes."

"Right. Time we were going. Mike, it's been nice meeting you," Ray says, scrambling to his feet. I notice, belatedly, that he's wearing snowshoes.

"Indeed. Dief, time to re-join the team," Ben adds.

The wolf doesn't respond, and Ray comes around my side of the fire, grabbing Diefenbaker's jaw and making him look up. "Dief. _Diefenbaker._ In the harness, _now_."

Diefenbaker makes some kind of growly-complaining noise, but obeys. The cold air crowds in as soon as he's gone, but I can still feel my toes, so it's not too bad. Ray harnesses him up and vaults lightly into the front of the sled, the move speaking of long practice.

"Hike!" Ben calls, and the team moves away. They're barely out of sight before I hear engine noises, several of them, getting closer.

There are voices, too, carrying equally well over the snow. "Mike? Mike, are you there? Can you hear us? Mike, please shout if you can hear us!"

I inhale, and it's a little easier now, with the fire warming the air. "Here!" I cough, and try again. "I'm over here!"

They find me pretty quickly after that, their snowmobiles pulling up in a rough semicircle around my makeshift shelter, and I'm happy to see that the Professor is among them. One of the locals – I think he's a cop, but I can't tell under the heavy coat – puts a blanket around me. "It was a good idea to make that fire, son," he says. "Don't know where you got the wood from, though."

"It wasn't me," I explain. "There were these two guys, with a dogsled team. One of them stayed with me and built the fire while the other one went to find you. You saw him, right? Dark hair, one of those hats with a flat brim, goes by the name of Ben?"

The rescue team exchange glances, laden with meanings that I can't interpret. Professor Hennessey, off to one side, merely looks puzzled.

"There was a man with a dog team," one of the women admits. "He told me where 'd seen you, but by the time I'd called everyone together, he was gone. I couldn't find his tracks."

The cop, who'd wandered off to examine the ground, looks up. "I can't find any tracks here, either. No footprints, no paw prints, no sled runners."

Another woman, this one with iron-gray hair and the tough, weathered look of someone who's spent all her life outdoors, crouches down near me. For a moment, I'm reminded of Ray.

"Did the other man have a name? And the white dog?" she asks, her voice harsh.

My jaw drops. How did she know? "Ray. And he's not a dog, he's a wolf, and he's called Diefenbaker."

She nods, satisfied, then straightens up. "He saw m . . . Fraser and Kowalski."

The locals look fairly uncomfortable, but nobody refutes the claim. Professor Hennessey is the only one to speak. "Excuse me, Maggie? Fraser and Kowalski?"

The old woman's voice falls into a rhythmic cadence, almost hypnotic, drawing us all into her tale. "It was forty, fifty years ago that they started appearing. People checked the records and found out who they were. Constable Benton Fraser of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and Detective Stanley Kowalski, who answers to Ray. It is said that sometimes, a traveller in trouble will see them . . ."

 _. . . and when you're sure of the way home, or when the rescue party have nearly found you, they'll disappear. You'll hear the bark of the dogs, the rush of the snow under the runners, and then they'll be gone. And try though you may, you'll never find their tracks._


End file.
